Styling Around the TV

Monday, February 6, 2012

Many of us have a love/hate relationship with our tv's - especially when there are multiple focal points in a room such as fireplace and tv. I have touched on this topic before here and still receive questions about what to do because each home comes with a unique layout. Because of the complicated layout of our family room, with no regrets we made the decision to mount the tv over the fireplace. It was absolutely the thing to do for us.

For quick reference I created a pinboard called media on Pinterest where I pin examples of how tv's fit into decor. Many of the images are of tvs located over the mantel, but here are a few examples of keeping the two focal points separate.

31 comments:

This has always been a sore subject with me. In our last house, I never got around to styling around the TV mainly b/c I couldn't decide on what art to hang on the walls. I really like the last picture - no art on the walls (besides the TV) yet it looks styled and great!

Beautiful images! I just finished up a media wall yesterday at a friend's house. We did a gallery wall and it looks awesome - will share when the whole room is complete! Oh and we have our tv over our fireplace too. No regrets here either... it just works for us! Happy Monday to you!

you have NO IDEA how many hours I've spent on pinterest trying to solve this dilemma. We placed the tv on the mantel in our last home but thanks to amazingly high ceilings and a mantel built to scale, that just didn't work in our home in Richmond. I'll be sure to share if I ever figure out a vignette built around it that I'm happy with.

We just mounted a tv in our basement and I am all about trying to distract the eye. I've definitely got to tackle this issue soon.....looking forward to checking out your pinterest board for inspiration!

I'll have to check out your board for this design on Pinterest because I think it's so important and necessary especially in family homes. A TV needs to be somewhere and not necessarily hidden. I love that these images really just show the TV as part of the design which is reality. Your TV looks great mounted above your fireplace!

I have an issue with competing focal points in my family room as well. I have to keep the TV and fireplace separated due to the layout, but I have a TV above a fireplace at our other home in Lexington and it works great!

What an awesome idea for a pinboard. I really love the Thrift Decor Chick image because it is hard tto find something long and low that looks pretty but doesn't interfere wiviewing. An old sugar mold does the trick!Camille

Rene...this is probably one of the biggest discussions in design today. Where the space above the mantle was always reserved for a nice "focal piece"....it seems that the TV has replaced that in most homes. I would rather see it there than in a bookcase to the right or left. TV...is a reality in today's homes where the LR has been eliminated for just one large family room. So as much as people fight me on this.....I stand firm. They always start complaining that it will be too high. I say hogwash to them....

Rene,I must check out your pinboard on this subject. Right now it is on the wall in the family room, but in our new (old) house in Ct, we will only have a living room and the third floor will be a space for the kids. But when I want to watch something it has to be on the main floor. I'm kind of excited about the at&t wireless TV's. The logical place in a room with a fireplace is to use that as the focal point to arrange your room around...but I can't imagine walking in my front door and seeing a giant TV. Interesting subject for sure.annieP.s. Are you going to be in SoCal for Spring break?

Personally, I don't mind the look of a big honkin' TV on the wall, but living in an historical house, it's something I've thought a lot about. I think there are definitely ways to minimize it as a focal point.

Since the eye goes to the area of highest contrast, painting the wall a dark color behind a black TV will help "hide" it. Then by having a high value contrast on something else like a mantel painted white against the same dark walls, it should be a stronger focal point.

I've also wanted to try painting wide horizontal stripes where a dark stripe hits right across the TV.

I do like the one setup with the white chest where the boxwoods soften the sharp edges of the TV. That's really smart.

This is a hot topic on everyone's brain. I did a post on this last year and it was my most viewed post of record. I just followed you on Pinterest and pinned several of the examples to my new "media" board! Great idea, why I haven't had one before now beats me. Good post!